Nurture
by jetflight girl
Summary: The sheriff of Megaton recalls the day the hero of the Wasteland appeared at the gates of his city with a child in her arms. A child of two monsters, but would it be nature or nurture that guided the child growing up?


"Hah! What are you gonna do, call your mommy?" The boy was probably eleven or so. A newcomers kid, lanky and scrawny and swarthy. Lanky, currently, being the key word as he held the teddy-bear in his raised hand, firmly out of reach of the younger girl in front of him.

The girl in question, stopped trying to grab the toy and lowered her arms. She pushed a brown strand of hair out of her face and then crossed her arms on her chest, leaning backwards in an entirely familiar manner. "Yes. Yes, I actually will, if you don't give it back."

Sheriff Simms had to hold back the snort as the threat registered with the boy: he went pale, thrust the teddy-bear at the girl and turned to leave in a hurried walk. Simms remembered the time his own son had been in the "my daddy can beat up your daddy" phase and... well, being that Harden's daddy was an experienced wastelander, a Regulator and the sheriff, he had some advantages in that.

Marie, in contrast, only had a mommy... one that no one, sane or otherwise, wanted to piss off. The sheriff smiled, looking at the victorious grin on the girls face as she hugged her toy and went back to playing. In his age, time... had a tendency to fly, if he thought back at the day he first saw the girl and her foster mother arrive in Megaton.

* * *

The weather was being awful. The wind picked up sand and dirt and dust and twirled it around the wasteland hard enough to be annoying, but too slow to be considered a full-blown sandstorm. Which meant Simms and Stockholm were stuck trying to find a place to hide from the twirling dust. A full-blown sandstorm would've been preferable, because then they could've just gone home and called it a day and hid in their homes as everyone else, because not even super mutants were crazy enough to try and attack during a sandstorm.

So, Simms was stuck brooding in a corner between the two gates of Megaton. Being a decently closed-off place, it had the luxury of not being in the path of the winds and, for boredom's sake, he could also exchange a few words with Stockholm, who had huddled down against the floor of his platform. The storm was slow, the day was slow, their discussion was slow, the world was slow. At least until Stockholm noted "Someone's coming," elaborated "holding something" and finally "Holy shit, I think it's Six!"

And then the gate opened. Until the day he died, this image would be burnt into Simms' mind: the post-nuclear Mother Mary with her ragged coat's tail riding in the wind, a child in her arms and an assault rifle hanging on her side. She appeared exhausted - and that's considering Simms couldn't even see her face behind the burlap cloth covering everything but her goggles.

"Well damn, it's been a while!" Simms said, eying the moving bundle in Six' arms as the main gate closed behind them. The sheriff opened the heavy inner gate and followed Six through.

"Less than it feels like, I think," she replied and made for her home. Curious, the sheriff followed along and entered the so-called Lone Wanderer's home; he was uninvited, sure, but his curiosity got the better of him.

The bundle was, indeed, a child. A healthy baby girl with brown eyes full of curiosity as she looked around after being set on the bed while Six dropped her packs and rifle. "So, uhh..." Simms finally asked, looking for similarities. "I know you were gone for a while, but... Well, should I invite Mr. Creel over and tell him you have news for him?"

The Vault-grown wastelander had, by then, gone over to deal with the kid. "What?" she asked distractedly, turning her faded blue gaze at the sheriff. "Oh. No. She's not his," she explained, then, catching the not-so-clear meaning, quickly added: "Err, and not mine, either."

"Sounds like a story," Simms added. "Care to share?" He knew Three Dog's pet subject well enough. Her solutions may have been harsh at times and her warfare against raiders was brutal and merciless, but she was not the type to kidnap children.

"Sure. Wadsworth? Please show sheriff Simms to our clean water reserves," she called out to the floating robot before turning back to Simms. "Warm up one bottle of clean, one water of regular water. The fridge has mac&cheese, so kindly make us some with another bottle of water." Seeing the sheriff pause at being ordered around, she raised an eyebrow. "Well you can also change her diapers, if you'd prefer."

That got the sheriff moving. He had done it, back in the day with Harden, but it was not something he cared to repeat with a stranger's baby. With the snide robot's help, all three humans were eating soon: Simms was more nibbling out of courtesy while Six was eating with a good appetite, as was the baby discreetly blocking Simms' view of Six' exposed breast.

"So where HAVE you been? You leave without saying anything, then are gone for months and when you do return, you return with a baby that's too old to be yours even if you were REALLY good at hiding," Simms finally broke the silence.

"I went to the Pitt," Six responded with a shrug.

That got the sheriff's attention. "The Pitt? How in the hell - and why - did you end up there? I thought all it had was mutants."

"Not only, no. But... Well, let's put it that way: I found out where almost all of Paradise Falls 'merchandise' is going, fought a massive war to free slaves and destroy a raider city. It took a lot of bullets," the wanderer explained between mouthfuls.

"So all in a days work, huh?" Simms snorted.

"Yeah. Even if it is the craziest, most dangerous thing I've done so far, but... well, it had to be done. As a Regulator, I'm sure you understand that."

The sheriff nodded, then eyed the baby contentedly breastfeeding. "That doesn't explain the kid, however... You mentioned she's not yours, so whose is she?"

Six looked down at the baby and smiled at a cooing sound the little human made. "I've adopted her."

There was a moment of silence. Then that moment dragged on and on, and Simms finally broke it: "Yeah, I get that. But..."

The blonde wanderer sighed and raised her head, looking at the dark-skinned sheriff. "You want the whole story? Then you're gonna have to swear you'll keep it to yourself. And I mean a serious, Regulator honour and my pistol enforced oath."

Lucas raised an eyebrow and adjusted himself on his chair. "Sounds serious. But fine, you have it: I'll keep the story to myself, lest I disgrace my coat and get shot by you. Except if it turns out I don't like the story, of course."

Six looked at the child again, stroked her head gently and smiled, but the smile was not a happy one. "She's the daughter of two complete, utter monsters. Human-shaped and human-gened on the outside, but wicked beyond reason in soul. Her father was the king of the raiders. He was the one that bought the slaves to work for him. He needed a lot of them because they had a tendency to die from disease, dehydration, malnutrition, bored raiders and, of course, 'games' organized for his amusement. Yes - in addition to everything else, he liked to watch his already emaciated slaves kill each other for his and his raiders' amusement," she spoke quietly. "Her mother was, believe it or not, a raider scientist. Yeah, I know, but she was," Six added quickly, seeing the disbelieving look on his face. "Unlike her husband, she wasn't actively malicious. Not because she was squeamish, of course; the slaves whom she experimented on were simply beneath her notice. Subhuman."

"Sounds like they were real pieces of work..." Simms mused. "So what happened to them?"

"I killed them. Both of them. Shot her in the face right next the crib, grabbed Marie and made a break for it. There was a large battle going on between the slave rebels and the raiders, so I met him leading his men later on and shot him, too. He at least went down fighting, for what it's worth." The calmness with which Six explained all this sent a chill down Simms' spine. "You know how Moriarty thinks Billy killed Maggie's parents and took her for his own? Well, I always thought it was bullshit, because he's a good guy... but now? It might sound brutal out of context, but killing my stepdaughter's adopted parents was a favour to the world," the blonde's voice hardened.

After a while, the sheriff shook his head. "No. If they were as you describe them, you did the right thing. This story stays between the two of us."

Six snorted bitterly. "And hope it's nurture, not nature, eh? I'll... tell her, eventually. Carefully. And when she's old enough to understand."

* * *

"Nature versus nurture," Simms whispered under his breath, watching the now nine years old child play. She did have a tendency to be headstrong and menacing - well, as menacing as an eight year old girl can get - but... Well, her mother in all things but blood often used subtle intimidation in her dealings, too, and that was it.

Right?


End file.
